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We thank Thee, Lord, for all Thy blessings to us. We praise Thee for daily care and nightly mercies. We beseech Thee that Thou wouldst help us to offer up to Thee not only the words of thanksgiving but the sacrifice of loving, trustful, and obedient hearts, and that our characters may become more like what Thou wouldst have us to be. We have to pray for the forgiveness of many imperfections and sins. We could not lose the consciousness of our own shortcomings. We pray Thee to deliver us from all illusions as to our own strength and our own righteousness. We pray Thee for quickened consciences, enlightened by Thee; and we beseech Thee that Thou wouldst preserve us from ever losing sight of our own deep necessities, or from ever seeing them so mountainous and great as that they obscure Thy greater mercy and Thy more than sufficient supplies. May we ever hold in one grasp our own need and Thy infinite riches, our own sinfulness and Thy free blessing, our own deficiencies and Thy wealth.

When we come to Thee, O Lord, we are overwhelmed with the number of Thy mercies. They cannot be reckoned up in order unto Thee; they can only be reckoned up in order by Thee. And yet we pray that we may have a clear perception of, and a more adequate thankfulness for, and a more entire dependence upon, Thy loving heart and Thine innumerable mercies. Draw us, we beseech Thee, to Thyself by thoughts of Thee; and when there rise up in our consciences the sins that are more than the hairs of our heads, and we feel as if we durst not look up, may the thought of Thy greater mercies, more numerous still than these, strengthen and encourage us. What should we do if the measure of Thy forgiveness did not overlap and exist far beyond the measure of any man’s or of all men’s sin? We thank Thee that we can cast ourselves on Thee, and flee to Thee from ourselves; and we beseech Thee that Thy good Spirit, which Thou dost give to them that ask Thee, may indeed dwell in our hearts, and mould us by the power of thankfulness for Thy service. May it be true of us, too, that we delight to do Thy will, and that Thy law is within our hearts. We come to Thee empty-handed, sacrifice and offering Thou dost not require; Thou hast provided it. We come to Thee to receive, not to give; we come as those for whom the great offering has already been presented which makes all ours needless, except as thank-offerings. And we pray Thee to help us to render ourselves to Thee in entire surrender and devotion, as the token of our grateful acceptance of Thy greatest gift.